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 Last May, we told you about a slim volume of home-spun tales by a retired musician remembering his 1940s childhood in rural Pennsylvania.
What made that book, True Confessions of a Kid, remarkable, however, was that it was written by Ron Miscavige, father to Scientology leader David Miscavige, and a man who literally had to escape from Scientology’s secretive International Base in California in 2012. We broke the news of Ron’s escape from Scientology, and we’re still waiting to hear the man tell his story of souring on his son’s organization. Instead, Ron put out a book of childhood yarns. And now, he’s done it again. In Hideouts for Midgets on the Lam and other totally disrelated stories, we are told again about what it was like to grow up in Mt. Carmel, Pennsylvania, where coal was king, and where young Ron began playing trumpet professionally in bars at only 13. Continue reading Hideouts for Scientologists on the lam: Another book from Ron Miscavige
 It’s time for Sunday Funnies, when we take a look at the Scientology mailers and fliers that our tipsters send us from around the world.
As Scientology withers (see yesterday’s dire news about that if you haven’t already), we can’t help being very curious about which poor souls are still taking part and putting on a good face about all of the pressure to donate money. As always, we’d love to hear more about the people you see in these fliers. If you recognize someone, let us know. Continue reading Scientology Sunday Funnies: Sydney nears its big day, and Silicon Valley is in high gear!
 Jon Atack is the author of A Piece of Blue Sky, one of the very best books on L. Ron Hubbard and Scientology. He has a new edition of the book for sale, and he’s helping us sift through the legends, myths, and contested facts about Scientology that tend to get hashed and rehashed in books, articles, and especially on the Internet.
Once again, Jon is taking on Scientology’s most basic beliefs and putting them under a microscope. This week, he has some thoughts for us about how Scientologists internalize L. Ron Hubbard’s toxic policies of Disconnection and Fair Game. Continue reading Jon Atack’s final weekly column for us on Scientology, and it’s a doozy
 Our video source came through with another gem this week. It’s the “quote video” that Scientology created to help sell the Unification Congress, that fateful Phoenix event in December 1954 when L. Ron Hubbard explained how he was going to unify Dianetics (which he had invented in 1950) with Scientology, which he had developed in 1952.
Here’s how Bridge Publications describes this set of lectures, which it sells for $225.00… Continue reading Video Vault: Hear L. Ron Hubbard unite Dianetics and Scientology in connubial bliss!
 Claudio and Renata Lugli Last year, we were fortunate enough to find ourselves in northern Italy at a lovely time of year. We made a jaunt to Venice. We strolled through Milan. We even happened to catch the final day of professional cycling’s Tour of Italy — Giro d’Italia — in the city of Brescia. And while we were in that town, we made a pilgrimage. We stopped by to meet Claudio and Renata Lugli, parents to Tiziano Lugli, the well-known Los Angeles ex-Scientologist who tends to get mistaken for Tom Cruise by tabloid media. Continue reading We asked David Miscavige’s tailor for his exact height — and here’s what he told us!
 Ken Dandar On March 17, retired Pinellas County, Florida circuit judge Crockett Farnell ordered attorney Ken Dandar to pay $1,068,156.50 to the Church of Scientology Flag Service Organization, Inc. FSO runs Scientology’s “spiritual mecca,” the Flag Land Base or “Flag” in Clearwater, Florida where, in 1995, a Scientologist from Dallas named Lisa McPherson died after spending 17 days in the Fort Harrison Hotel, Flag’s centerpiece. Dandar represented McPherson’s family in a wrongful death lawsuit against Scientology that was settled with the church in 2004. How he then ended up, a decade later, personally owing Scientology $1 million is a bizarre story of unprecedented legal conflict between state and federal courts in Florida, and it may be years more before the final chapter of that conflict is written. Continue reading Florida attorney Ken Dandar hit with $1 million penalty for taking on Scientology
 Oh, you naysayers. Sure, you made fun of Scientology’s new E-meters, the ones that were made years ago and then gathered dust in a warehouse. The gleaming machines that David Miscavige expected every Scientologist to buy at $5,000 each (and a second one as a backup). The machines that still, 60 years after Scientology founder L. Ron Hubbard first introduced them to the organization, remain extremely simplistic contraptions that measure fluctuations in skin galvanism. Or, if you’re a Scientologist, they read your mind! You cannot defeat them! They can see into your soul!
Ahem. Continue reading Hey, you guys, the new Scientology E-meter is a hit!
 Yesterday, Paris elected its first woman mayor, Anne Hidalgo. But as our man in France Jonny Jacobsen explains, she has a lot more interest for us here in the Underground Bunker than the fact that she’s female and from Spain…
Paris has, not surprisingly, elected another socialist mayor. Continue reading Paris elects its first female mayor — and you have to see her record on Scientology!
 Hey, we sure had a fun time last night live-blogging the Scientology episode of H2’s ‘America’s Book of Secrets.’ It turned out to be an excellent show, and covered an amazing amount in only an hour. The episode will be on many more times, and as soon as it’s available at H2’s website, we’ll let you know.
Also, if you didn’t get a look at it yet, we’re happy that the New York Post let us go on at length about Russell Miller’s terrific book, Bare-Faced Messiah, being republished 27 years after Scientology’s litigation tactics kept it out of this country. Continue reading Sunday Funnies: These fliers should convince you to give all your cash to Scientology!
 Yesterday, we told you that Luis and Rocio Garcia had taken an interesting new direction in their federal fraud lawsuit against Scientology. After spending a few months gathering evidence about several Scientology entities, they decided to drop three Scientology trusts as defendants, and then requested the right to amend their original complaint.
They filed that request on Wednesday, just one day before Scientology was due to make its own filing to support its motion to dismiss the lawsuit on jurisdictional grounds. Continue reading Scientology answers the Garcias — And turns over a trove of internal documents
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Last May, we told you about a slim volume of home-spun tales by a retired musician remembering his 1940s childhood in rural Pennsylvania.
